MANITOWOC - The days of being a promising green energy startup racking up industry awards and praise from the White House had given way to more dire matters in 2012 when John Scribante was handed the keys to Orion Energy.

Founder turned CEO Neal Verfeurth had just been fired. An SEC probe was underway following a troubled IPO. And most pressing — the company was less than six months away from running out of cash.

“Our board said, ‘This isn’t going to end well,’” said Scribante, who replaced Verfeurth as CEO. “The company was in serious trouble.”

Enter Scribante, who’d cut his teeth in sales at Orion and was now being asked to save a once-vaunted company that had gone from being a guest at the White House and hosting a visit by President Barack Obama to being on the brink of collapse.

John Scribante(Photo: Courtesy Orion Energy)

Four years later, Scribante says the ship has been righted.

In early September, Orion unveiled a new LED commercial light fixture the company says is far and away the most efficient on the market — and one Scribante believes re-establishes the Manitowoc-based energy efficient light-maker as a top innovator.

It follows a multi-year effort to untangle the company from failed forays into solar and wind energy and to instill a new sense of financial discipline that has seen the company sell off real estate and drop the company jet.

“We had to do what we needed to do to survive and build a business that’s sustainable,” Scribante said. “We’ve got it put together now. … Today is not the time to be betting against us.”

But to convince the investment community, the company will have to back it up after years of false starts, unfulfilled promises and damaged credibility.

“One of the things I’ve always been concerned about is it seems like the company is always on the come,” said George Reis, an investment adviser and president of GVR Investment Management in Two Rivers, who feels the stock remains too speculative for his clients.

Scribante sees this as a watershed moment for Orion, having just unveiled a product he believes will turn heads in the commercial lighting industry.

But getting here hasn’t been easy.

The first 18 months of Scribante’s tenure saw a complete overhaul of the company. Everything was fair game in the reboot — from the products Orion makes to what types of desks employees sit at.

Gone are the cubicles and executives offices, which have been replaced by an open-concept office where everyone, including the executives, work side-by-side at long, cafeteria-style tables.

Instead of employees tucked away in departments and isolated in different wings where they can dodge calls and hide behind emails, everything is out in the open.

“We’re solving problems now in 20 to 30 minutes, instead of three to four days,” Scribante said.

Among the many changes Orion Energy made in recent years was to create an open-concept office space to allow for a more collaborative and nimble culture.(Photo: Josh Lintereur/USA TODAY NETWORK - Wisconsin)

But it’s not just the cube walls that are gone — so are many long-time workers.

The drastic changes caused about three-quarters of the company’s payroll to turn over, either from employees leaving on their own or being escorted out and replaced. There have also been several rounds of layoffs.

Today, the payroll stands at about 185 permanent workers, and another 100 temps brought in at peak times, which is down from a high of 285 full-time employees when Scribante took over.

“We got a bad rap in the community … but it was very strategic and we had to do it,” he said. “You have to go into the ditch before you can come out, and it’s hard to explain that to people who are trying to believe in you, yet you’re taking them deeper into the ditch.”

The company has since freed up capital by selling off its Manitowoc headquarters and factory and then leasing back only what it needs. It also sold off the company jet and dropped side ventures, including solar and wind technology projects.

Within 18 months after Scribante took over, the company had generated an additional $10 million in cash after being down to just $6 million.

“We became very financially sound in that first year and a half," he said.

Company reborn as LED maker

When Scribante took the reins, the company had one LED product and remained focused on fluorescent technology, which is now headed for obsolescence.

Scribante immediately elected to hit the accelerator on LED products. The problem was, it forced Orion to build out a brand-new company, with new suppliers, tooling and customers.

The work stations in Orion Energy's Manitowoc production plant are made out of wood so employee can customize the production line and make changes aimed at increasing productivity.(Photo: Josh Lintereur/USA TODAY NETWORK - Wisconsin)

After seeing the company’s stock rebound and climb to more than $7 a share after getting its fiscal house in order, Orion’s profit margins swiftly collapsed as it burned through cash in winding down its declining fluorescent business and moving into LED.

Soon after, the stock was back below $2 a share, where it remains today.

Reis said investors still need to see the company stick to a strategy after hitting the reset button numerous times in its history. He said the company also needs to re-establish its reputation after a messy divorce with founder Neal Verfuerth in 2012, which has since spawned multiple lawsuits between the two sides.

“The investment community wants stability and integrity,” Reis said. “You like to invest in companies that are clean and you don’t need this extra additive of lawsuits.”

A brighter future

Scribante concedes the company has taken its lumps from shareholders and with community members still dismayed after many long-time workers were shown the door.

But they’re quickly rebuilding their standing with the local workforce.

“It’s a new environment. In the community, we now have the reputation that Orion is a great place to work,” he said. “Two years ago, we were probably the worst place to work.”

A bigger challenge will be showing Wall Street the company has regained its footing after years of operating in survival mode.

The company recorded a $2.94 million net loss in its fiscal first quarter that ended June 30, but its order backlog more than doubled during the quarter, which company leaders believe could bring profitability.

Most importantly, the company feels it took a major step toward rebuilding its brand with the introduction of its third-generation ISON Class LED High Bay fixture, which it says is by far the most efficient commercial high bay fixture on the market.

Orion claims the product consumes 42 percent less energy than the average competitor’s fixture, and it brings the payback period to under two years for companies investing in energy efficient lighting.

“It illustrates our technical superiority in the industry,” Scribante said. “Nobody knows how we do this. The rest of the industry is puzzled.”

The product comes as Orion continues to move out of the fluorescent market, which still makes up about a quarter of the business but could be gone within a few years.

Schools, hospitals and warehouses have been the quickest to adopt LED technology, while automakers are also beginning to make the switch.

Currently, less than 5 percent of the 1 billion commercial light fixtures in the U.S. are LED, according to the U.S. Department of Energy, meaning there’s an estimated $200 billion of business up for grabs.

Scribante recently told analysts the company is better positioned going forward to grab a much larger slice of the pie.

That's because Orion has shifted it sales strategy from selling direct with its own sales staff and through energy service companies, which together captures just 13 percent of the market, to using wholesalers and distributors, which make up the remainder.

Thus, instead of Orion having a couple dozen sales people, it now has 1,500 sales staff working for it via its distributors and none of them is on the company’s payroll.

Now, the company just has to deliver.

“We came out of the ashes of a pretty bleak situation,” Scribante said. “I see our prospects for growth to be significant … we’re not 100 percent out of the woods yet, but we’re in the bottom of the seventh going into the eighth.”